It may be American Cheese Month, but for me, everymonth is American Cheese Month. Heck, every dayis. It’s been that way for twenty years, having been an American cheese enthusiast and cheerleader all my cheese life. And so it is that when the Planet Cheesemaven herself invited me to write a guest post on my passion subject, I answered with an enthusiastic, “Yes!” Not only was I thrilled to be asked to do this, but I was especially happy to be shining the light on five American cheeses and cheesemakers by way of Planet Cheese.
Read moreJack’s Next Chapter
It was a sad day for American cheese lovers when Ig Vella passed away in 2011. Losing this crusty, cantankerous, opinionated cheesemaker was bad enough. But what would become of Vella Dry Jack, his California company’s flagship creation? Would it change for the worse without his oversight? “I can tell you a lot of people were worried about it,” his daughter Chickie told me recently.
Read moreCheese Gets Soaked
Wine with cheese? Of course. Wine on cheese? Absolutely. It may seem gimmicky, but steeping cheese in wine has a long history, especially in Italy. Some say it dates to World War I, when people would bury their wheels in wine barrels to hide them from soldiers. I would bet it’s an older practice than that. In any case, the niche has a new entry—and a particularly tasty one. The newcomer is on the right, above, alongside one of the category’s best sellers. With autumn coming at us and the wine-grape harvest underway, it’s a nice time to get acquainted with these “drunken” beauties.
Read moreBorn-Again Cheese
After a long hiatus, Cowgirl Creamery’s beloved cottage cheese is back. Plump, tender curds in a thick and tangy dressing—ready to dollop on peaches for breakfast or top with cherry tomatoes for lunch. If you think of cottage cheese as grandma food, or grim diet food, prepare for a revelation.
Read moreBlockbuster Cheese
You’re not imagining it. Burrata is everywhere. A cheese that almost nobody knew 20 years ago (even in Italy) is now summer’s blockbuster. Retailers struggle to keep it in stock, and chefs have taken it well beyond the predictable insalata caprese. What else can you do with this dreamy dairy queen?
Read moreHow Rich Can Cheese Be?
Triple-cream cheeses are the industry’s gateway drug. Who isn’t seduced by all that buttery goodness? Cowgirl Creamery’s Mt. Tam, Brillat-Savarin, Explorateur—these luscious creations take cheese to the limits of richness. Pass the walnut bread. But now the triple-cream niche has a new challenger for the butterfat crown. Are you ready for quintuple-cream cheese?
Read moreBumpy Ride for Cheesemakers
This is not the Manhattan skyline. It’s the average price of milk paid to America’s dairy farmers between June 2012 and March 2018. Who can operate a business with price swings like this? Not surprisingly, many dairy farmers can’t. Between January and July of this year, 338 Wisconsin dairy farms stopped milking cows.
Read moreIs A2 Yogurt for You?
Yogurt. Blueberries. Now’s the moment. I’m a cheerleader for plain whole-milk yogurt because it’s so easy to add fresh fruit myself. The challenge, in some markets, is finding yogurt that meets my specs: plain, whole milk, stabilizer-free (no pectin, no gelatin) and not Greek. Straus Family Creamery is my go-to, but a new California yogurt checks all those boxes as well. What’s more, it’s made with A2 milk.
Read moreNow Here’s a Fresh Idea
From Turin to San Francisco is 9,500 miles, a long journey if you’re a cheese. Fresh cheeses like ricotta and mozzarella have to travel by air, which makes the cost spike. Inspections or missing paperwork can delay entry, further shortening the precious selling time. So here’s one Italian creamery’s solution to the fresh-cheese challenge: produce it in California. Northern Italian know-how meets West Coast milk.
Read moreShow Canada Some Love
The Canada-bashing coming from the White House lately will do nothing to help achieve my goal for U.S.-Canada relations. I want to see more Canadian cheese in the U.S., not less, and the heated rhetoric has me worried. I felt bad about the name-calling from our side, so I picked up a pound of aged Canadian Cheddar, just as a one-woman show of support.
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